Chapter 270 — Blades Standing Like a Mountain 1
The moment the door to the side room closed, Yeongu knew he had entered not a meeting chamber, but a killing ground.
He was not a bound prisoner.
He was not a spy who had crept in by stealth.
He had walked in with his own two feet to meet Yelü Zhangnu.
Yet now, when the discussion was over, they meant to settle it with violence.
Had they met on the battlefield, they would not have done this.
If words could open a path, he had not intended to use the blade.
The last clap spread through the pillars and rafters.
A brief silence settled.
Within that silence, the first thing he heard was footsteps.
They were not the footsteps of one or two people.
From beneath the floor, behind the doors, and beyond the curtains, many feet shifted at once.
Leather shoes pressed against the floor.
Metal struck waist belts.
Armor leaves brushed against one another with a low sound.
The curtain on the left parted first.
From behind it, personal guards carrying shields advanced two by two.
The edges of their round shields were bound with iron, and low spearpoints showed above them.
They walked without speaking.
Their steps belonged to trained men.
Those in front raised their shields and blocked the way.
Those behind lowered their spear shafts to waist height.
Men also came from behind the pillars on the right.
The sounds of hwandō being drawn from their scabbards followed one after another.
Srrrng.
Srrk.
Cold silver blades slid out and flashed in the lamplight.
When dozens of blades swallowed the light and spat it back all at once, the air in the room changed in an instant.
The place where words had passed only moments ago had become a place where one wrong breath might be cut apart.
The doorway was blocked as well.
Two men stood before the closed door, and four more stood behind them.
Every spearpoint faced inward.
It was a formation meant to deny any path of escape.
Even if someone opened the door from outside, one would still have to pass through those spears and shields within.
Behind them, five men slowly revealed themselves.
Unlike the soldiers, they wore only light armor, and the weapons in their hands were all different.
One gripped a long blade with both hands.
One let two short blades hang at his sides.
Another held a spear upright, though its point did not tremble.
The remaining two seemed empty-handed, but Yeongu felt metal hidden at their waists and inside their sleeves.
They did not mix into the front line.
They stood one step behind, watching Yeongu's shoulders and the ends of his feet.
The footsteps swelled, then stopped all at once.
Once they stopped, the room became even more dangerous.
The breathing behind the shields, the sound of hands tightening around leather-wrapped spear shafts, the glimmer of blade tips shaking against the walls—each thing became painfully clear.
Dozens of silver edges leaned toward Yeongu.
Their light lunged before the men's eyes did.
Yeongu slowly looked around.
Yelü Zhangnu had already stepped back.
A guard stood at his side, and the path behind him had been left open.
It was a position prepared from the beginning.
With three claps, the doors closed, the personal guards surrounded him, and the masters tightened the noose.
Yeongu let out a low breath.
"I came to talk, and yet you welcome me so grandly."
Yelü Zhangnu had already withdrawn, and the door was closed.
Before Yeongu, shields rose and spearpoints lay low.
From behind the left pillar came men with drawn blades, and from between the curtains on the right came men with short spears.
Behind them, five masters stood at measured intervals.
They did not rush in like ordinary soldiers.
They waited to see where Yeongu would move and which hand he would use first.
Yeongu was empty-handed.
He sighed quietly.
"I came to settle this with words. Must we truly do this?"
Instead of an answer, the first spear came.
The spearpoint did not aim for his chest.
It aimed between his thigh and belly.
They meant not to kill him, but to drop him and seize him.
At the same time, a hwandō came diagonally from the right.
Yeongu did not retreat as he avoided the spear.
Instead, he stepped half a pace inside the spear's reach and snatched the wrist of the man holding the hwandō.
It was a standard qinna technique.
The blade brushed past his collar.
Yeongu's hand twisted the wrist, and his knee struck the man's Zhangmen point.
The man took the blow in the side, and his breath caught as if cut off.
His fingers opened.
Yeongu took the short, slender hwandō from his hand.
In that instant, the air in the room changed.
The mere fact that the Goryeo general held a blade altered the atmosphere of the chamber.
He flicked it a few times as if testing it in play, and silver sword light rose at several angles, dazzling the eye.
It looked like a deliberate act to fit the new weapon to his own body.
The second spear came straight in.
Yeongu pressed the spear shaft down with the back of the blade.
The motion of blocking and the motion of thrusting followed in one chain.
The instant the spear shaft dipped, the tip of his hwandō touched the Danzhong point beneath the spearman's throat.
The movements were nearly simultaneous.
He did not drive it in deeply.
He simply pressed one point.
The man's chest stiffened, and his fingers released the spear shaft.
His knees lost strength first, and he sank to the floor.
A human life vanished with such emptiness.
A shield-bearer pushed forward with his shield.
Yeongu slid his blade inside the edge of the shield.
The tip scraped between iron and leather and opened the inside of the man's wrist.
The shield tilted.
Through that gap, Yeongu's shoulder entered, and the butt of the hwandō struck the Jiuwei point.
The shield-bearer fell backward with his mouth open.
His falling body blocked the path of the spearman behind him.
The soldiers surged in.
They did not look as though they were coming to strike Yeongu.
They looked as though they were rushing to find places to die.
When one man thrust a spear, that spear shaft blocked the next man's path.
When one man swung a blade, its tip grazed his comrade's shoulder.
When a shield pushed forward, the spearpoints behind it disappeared.
When the spearpoints rose, the shield in front trembled.
Yeongu placed his blade into each tangled opening.
He did not cut broadly.
He did not make great swings.
The blade moved shortly.
Wrists.
The inner elbow.
Beneath the armpit.
The side.
The inner thigh.
Below the throat.
Those were the places armor could never fully close if a man still wished to move.
The hwandō found those small gaps and entered them.
Every one of Yeongu's attacks struck a point tied to life.
The blade did not enter deeply.
It only pierced lightly and cut briefly.
Yet every place it touched was where a man's strength gathered or broke.
A man struck in the wrist dropped his blade.
A man struck in the side lost his breath.
A man whose inner thigh was opened collapsed from the leg first.
Those who touched Yeongu could not endure it and fell at once.
The master on the left moved first.
He slipped low between the soldiers.
His blade aimed for Yeongu's knee.
Yeongu did not retreat.
He raised his foot.
The blade tip grazed beneath the sole of his foot, and he stepped down on the back of the blade.
The master's eyes widened.
In that instant, Yeongu's hwandō scraped past the Jianjing point above his shoulder.
Blood rose late.
The master's arm sagged.
He tried not to release his blade, but his fingers no longer obeyed him.
The second master immediately followed.
He gripped a long blade in both hands and brought it down from above.
Yeongu shoved a falling soldier into him.
The long blade struck the comrade's shoulder and stopped.
That pause was one breath.
Yeongu entered within that one breath, stabbed the tip of his hwandō below the Zhongwan point, and withdrew it.
It was not a deep stab, but internal force entered through the blade tip.
The master's belly folded inward.
Breath came from his mouth before blood did.
He collapsed forward with the blade still in his hands.
The room lost its path in an instant.
Bodies piled on the floor, and blood spread beneath their feet.
Those still alive had to step over the fallen to enter.
The floor underfoot was slippery.
One spearman lost balance.
Yeongu pushed him slightly and changed the direction of his fall.
The man collapsed into the knees of three of his comrades.
Yeongu passed over him.
As he passed, the hwandō opened the wrists and thighs of the three in turn.
Three screams burst out at once.
The third master circled in along the curtain.
His body was light.
His foot arrived before his blade.
Yeongu received the ankle with the back of his hwandō.
The moment the ankle was blocked, the back of the blade turned, and the tip stabbed above the ankle bone.
The master's body crumpled in midair.
Yeongu stepped in toward the falling man and received him with his shoulder, driving him away.
The master struck the pillar with the same force he had carried in flight.
The back of his head hit the pillar, and his body slid down.
The personal guards formed shields again.
This time, five made a line.
The round faces of the shields pushed in like a wall.
Yeongu waited for that wall.
When the shields came one inch closer, he kicked up a spear shaft from the floor with the end of his foot.
The shaft struck low beneath the shields.
The front line's feet tangled.
The shield wall tilted to one side.
Through that tilt, Yeongu's hwandō entered.
The first had his wrist cut.
The second was stabbed inside the elbow.
The third was struck in the gap below the clavicle.
The fourth had his inner thigh opened.
The fifth stepped back and tripped over the body of a fallen comrade.
Yeongu pushed that fifth man in the chest with his foot and knocked him down.
The shield wall collapsed in the shape in which it had stood.
Now the soldiers in the room charged while avoiding his eyes.
Yet those pushing in from behind had not seen what had happened ahead.
Those outside the door continued to come in without knowing what was occurring inside.
The newly arrived men immediately reached Yeongu.
The moment they touched him, they were cut, struck, or thrown down.
The sight grew more and more uncanny.
It no longer looked as though people were coming in to kill him.
It looked as if they were lining up to offer their vital points before the tip of his blade.
Yeongu did not pant.
He inhaled shortly, and each time the blade went out, he exhaled shortly.
Because his breathing did not break, his feet did not waver.
Short inhale.
Short exhale.
Each time the blade tip moved, his feet made the place first.
He moved according to footwork.
His left foot slid over a dry patch to avoid blood.
His right foot stepped on the belt of a fallen man.
His knees lowered, his waist turned, and his wrist followed last.
A blade was not something swung with wrist strength.
Power began in the foot, passed through the waist, and left through the fingertips.
The fourth master finally took Yeongu's back.
Two short blades entered from behind.
Yeongu lowered his body.
The two blades crossed each other in empty air.
From that lowered posture, he kicked backward in a mandarin-duck kick.
His heel struck the master's Qihai point.
The master's breath stopped.
At that moment, Yeongu's hwandō turned backward.
The blade tip entered without being seen and opened the inner thigh of the master.
He dropped both blades and sank down.
The last master stopped.
He did not enter any farther.
How could he step in when he knew he would die?
He had seen the places where his comrades had fallen.
He had seen the room where the personal guards had collapsed like a path.
Calculation rose in his eyes.
Yeongu moved before that calculation ended.
He kicked up a shield from the floor and blocked the man's sight.
The master cut the shield.
Through the split in the shield, Yeongu entered.
The butt of the hwandō struck the Renzhong point, and the back of the blade pushed beneath the jaw.
The master's head tilted back.
His blade came down half a beat late, but Yeongu was already beside him.
The short hwandō brushed past his wrist.
The blade fell, scattering silver light like a waterfall from a high mountain.
Yeongu drove his shoulder into the man's chest and pinned him to the wall.
Then he struck the Jiuwei point again.
The master slid down without a sound.
After that, it was less a fight than a cleanup.
There were still many personal guards, but their momentum had broken.
An army whose momentum has broken is no different from scattered baggage, no matter how large its number.
When the man in front hesitated, the man behind pushed his back.
The pushed man came before Yeongu's blade.
Yeongu received them one by one and turned them aside.
He blocked and stabbed.
He evaded and cut.
He pushed and struck.
With one motion, one man fell.
Sometimes two collapsed together in one motion.
At first, standing men filled the room.
Now fallen bodies filled the floor.
Those who remained stumbled about, unable to find a place to put their feet.
Yeongu moved by stepping over the fallen bodies.
He avoided pools of blood, avoided weapons, and avoided the throats of those still breathing.
His feet knew where to kill and where to spare.
But the blade did not hesitate.
Anyone who approached him paid the price.
When the last line collapsed, the sound in the room emptied for a moment.
Within that emptiness, someone's spear fell.
The iron struck the floor and rang long.
Hearing that sound, the remaining two men stepped back.
Yeongu did not pursue them.
He simply lowered the tip of the hwandō and steadied his breath.
Those two men saw his eyes and broke on their own.
One knelt.
The other dropped his blade.
Yeongu looked down at the hwandō, thick with blood.
The blade was short, and its edge had begun to dull.
Still, it was enough.
In this room, it had been far more than enough.
He walked toward the door.
Blood squelched underfoot, and someone's hand trembled near his ankle.
Yeongu stepped over it without crushing it.
The two guards fallen before the door were still breathing.
He flicked the hwandō once.
Blood splattered across the door panels.
"Egu, egu."
A low groan-like mutter slipped from his mouth.
He had come to settle matters with words.
He had tried to move Yelü Zhangnu's heart with documents and persuasion.
Yet Yelü Zhangnu had closed the meeting chamber and thrust blades at him.
A room blocked with men had finally made a path with blood.
Yeongu pushed the door.
The closed door slowly opened.
The bright light of the great hall poured over his bloodstained clothes.
He stepped out into that light.